Brussels’ steel tariffs are a slap in the face, says Britain’s industry

BRITAIN’S steel industry has described Europe’s latest attempt to fight off cheap imports from China as “a slap in the face”, claiming new tariffs are “totally inadequate”.

The European Commission announced yesterday that levies of between 9pc and 13pc would be introduced on China’s cheap exports of the metal used to reinforce concrete, known as “rebar”, to allow European steel makers to achieve a “reasonable profit” of 1.65pc.

It came as Sheffield Forgemasters, which supplies the Trident nuclear submarine programme, was handed a £30m support package by three of the largest firms in the industry. BAE Systems, Babcock and Rolls-Royce have agreed to underwrite a loan from US bank Wells Fargo, Sky News reported.

“The scale of the crisis affecting the European steel sector has not yet fully registered with Brussels bureaucrats,” said Gareth Stace, director of UK Steel, the industry body.

“Basing the provisional duties on a so-called ‘reasonable profit level’ of 1.65pc is a slap in the face for UK manufacturers of rebar, which has seen China taking more than 45pc of the UK market from zero in as little as four years.”

The tariffs are Europe’s latest attempt to prevent the steel crisis claiming further jobs across the continent. But Mr Stace said that unless they are revised higher swiftly, they will fail.

The pressure on European steel companies has intensified in recent months as Chinese rivals, experiencing declining sales in their home market, flood the export market with cheap steel.

The crisis has claimed more than 5,000 jobs at British companies, which are under even greater pressure than their European counterparts because of higher costs and less generous tax regimes, they claim. They say that Europe lags behind the US in efforts to protect domestic industry. “The Commission’s highly thorough investigation of Chinese exports has highlighted dumping margins in excess of a whopping 60pc,” Mr Stace said.

“If this was the US, we would have seen duties set at 66pc and brought in after 45 days from the start of the investigation. Not 9pc after almost a year.”

A spokesman for the Department for Business, Innovation & Skills said: “The UK has been at the forefront of pressing the Commission to take action on unfair steel dumping, and while we welcome the EU imposing duties, it’s disappointing that they are not higher in this case. We continue to lobby the Commission to do more and act faster.”